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Japan set to lift some Fukushima restrictions

PETER CAVE: The Japanese government has announced it will be lifting the evacuation advisory for five towns near the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant.

The order will allow about 30,000 people to return to their homes once they have been decontaminated.

I spoke to our North Asia correspondent, Mark Willacy who had just returned from a trip within the exclusion zone.

MARK WILLACY: Well it's saying that these municipalities in this area which is about 20 to 30 kilometres from the Fukushima plant have promised to decontaminate their areas, they've promised to restore what they're calling lifelines to meet the conditions for lifting this advisory.

So there is a feeling that these communities aren't as contaminated as the ones closer in to the Fukushima plant. So it means that about 30,000 people can return home. These areas weren't under a compulsory evacuation order, this was just an advisory which meant that residents could either evacuate or they should remain indoors.

Now about half of the people stayed about half left so those other half, the 30,000 can return, probably from around the weekend.

PETER CAVE: Given the amount of disinformation that's been put out by the power companies and to some extent by the government, are people going to be confident to do that?

MARK WILLACY: Well that's the big question. These municipalities involved, there are five of them, seem to believe that the situation is under control. They've convinced the central government in Tokyo that that's the case. So if these residents do believe their local government then everything's okay.

I think a lot of the distrust as you mentioned is towards TEPCO the operator of the plant and also the national government and the way it's handled the situation, there's been a feeling that it's been incompetent, indecisive, and that the political leadership really hasn't grasped the seriousness on the ground.

Now these local governments are saying we have got the situation under control, so please come back, we'll get everything de-contaminated and we'll get our lives back to normal. But for the communities closer in, within 20 kilometres of the plant and including some even further out that are hot spots, the future doesn't look quite as rosy.

PETER CAVE: Given the number of people that have to be moved and the cost of de-contamination, I guess the bill is going to be substantial?

MARK WILLACY: That's right and the bill is actually being discussed at the moment here in Tokyo and you know you are talking about tens of billions of dollars and in fact we're also talking about compensation bills for TEPCO, the operator of the plant.

And we've had a government panel overnight say that it is looking at four trillion yen in compensation costs at least. Now four trillion yen at today's exchange rate is about $AUD53 billion. So that Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, is facing a hefty bill but it's probably a bill that will be passed on to the Japanese government and from there to the Japanese consumer.

PETER CAVE: You've just come back from the exclusion zone, just give us some idea what it's like up there.

MARK WILLACY: Well it's quite eerie in parts. You drive along roads that have no other cars on them, there are men standing on the side of the roads wearing contamination suits. They look rather ghost like. So it is a very creepy scene.

And then you go into these communities where there's just not a soul around, the only living things are the odd stray dog or cat, saw some cows, farm animals that have been left to fend for themselves. We saw some dead farm animals too.

So it is a rather eerie, creepy feeling but it's like one of those science fiction movies where everyone's just disappeared overnight and you're the only one left in the town and it's going to be a long time before I think we'll see people back in those sorts of communities that are quite contaminated.

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